


An Excursion Across Time

by Songswald



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-30
Updated: 2013-06-30
Packaged: 2017-12-16 17:23:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/864646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Songswald/pseuds/Songswald
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor meets Hermione Granger and takes her one one trip to wherever she wants. Which is of course a library.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Excursion Across Time

**Author's Note:**

> Set pre-Clara and post-Ponds. Enjoy.

“Are you a wizard?” a 13 year old Hermione Granger says as she steps over the grass to the man standing there. He’s strangely dressed with pants that don’t quite reach his ankles, a tweed jacket, braces, and a bowtie. His face is a tad peculiar too. It’s the face of a younger man but something about the way he carries himself says he’s older than he looks. She idly notes that he doesn’t have eyebrows, which strikes her as odd. But perhaps the weirdest of all is the fact that he he’s traveling with a large black dog. That fact alone isn’t what’s off about it but the way the dog looks at her in a way that seems almost human.

 

Both the man and the dog turn to look at her when they hear her speak. She’d been up late reading (a habit that her parents abhorred) when she’d seen a green light through her curtains. In such a small neighborhood there was usually little disturbance late at night. She’d looked out her window to find the man, standing in the middle of the street, banging the metal object that had produced the light against his hand. It looked like he was attempting to get it to work. After a few seconds of fumbling, he had finally pointed it at what appeared to be thin air. Only it wasn’t, because a few seconds later a blue police box had appeared.

 

While Hermione had only known about the wizarding world for a little over two years, she had known that this man must be doing magic. Things didn’t just appear out of thin air in the muggle world. So she had proceeded to quietly open her window and climb out in order to apprehend this man. Not only was he doing magic out in the open where any random muggle could see him, but she had also never seen a wand made of metal and was unable to contain her curiosity.

 

So there she stands, in front of this odd man and his odd dog.

 

“What?” the man replies to her earlier question, his brow creasing and his fingers tapping against this leg in a nervous tick.

 

“A wizard,” she repeats, “I know you must be. No one can just make a police box appear out of nowhere. Although I’ve never seen a wand quite like yours. All the ones I’ve seen are made of wood. Mine’s vine wood. I bet you didn’t get that one from Olivander’s, did you? Oh and I’m Hermione Granger by the way.”

 

“Right. You’re a witch. No, this isn’t a wand and no I didn’t get it from… Olivander’s. And I haven’t time to explain right now. In fact I don’t have time to be telling you I don’t have time. So if you don’t mind I’ll just be off.” He reaches for the door to the police box.

 

“Wait a second; you can’t just be off like that. You know it’s illegal to do magic where muggles can easily see you. You’ll risk exposing our entire world.”

 

The man turns to her with a look of exasperation. “Of course. Illegal. Well don’t worry about me, I’ll reprimand myself. Now off you go. Back to bed.”

 

“If you think I’m about to let you just leave, you’re crazy.”

 

The man looks around, his fingers still drumming. He shifts his weight and it’s like he can never keep still. “Fine. Get in the box.”

 

“Into the-? What?” Hermione asks. But the man has already grabbed her hand and is pulling her into the police box after him. The black dog follows without being told.

 

But Hermione isn’t focusing on the dog. She stands inside what appeared to be an old police box from the outside and looks around in wonder. Her mind quickly flips through all her knowledge of various spells and charms. And then it hits her and she feels the realization spread across her face. “It’s bigger on the inside. It must be an Undetectable Extension Charm. I’ve never seen one in real life. Pretty advanced magic. Especially one this size.” She looks around the room and down a hallway. This man must be an extremely powerful wizard.

 

“Right. It’s an Unde-whatever charm. You might want to hold on.”

 

The man is pulling all sorts of levers and pushing various buttons and suddenly the entire room shifts and she’s thrown off balance. She falls down and slides across the floor, taking the dog down with her. It whimpers as all her weight falls on it and they hit one of the railings. The man laughs.

 

Finally they land and Hermione breathes a sigh of relief. She scoots forward off the dog which growls at her. “Stop it, Black,” the man says.

 

Hermione blinks. “You named a black dog Black?”

 

“It’s more of a last name,” he says and turns to address the dog which has now walked away from Hermione as if afraid she’s going to crush it again. “Now, I think I got in the general area of your godson’s house. And it should be about the same time we left. Although I sometimes do have trouble with landing in the right time.”

 

Hermione looks at him. “Why are you talking to the dog? And what do you mean ‘landing in the right time?’”

 

The man and the dog look at her. The man with an expression that practically screams annoyance and sarcasm. The dog with one that looks almost hurt at her inference that he wouldn’t understand what the man was saying.

 

He then proceeds to blatantly ignore her question. He opens the doors that lead to the outside and the dog follows behind him. Not about to be left behind, she gets up and trails after them.

 

The man stills for a moment and seems to taste the air. He spins around, a grin on his face, and rubs his hands together. “I think I got it right. Let’s see if I got it right.”

 

He totters off to a nearby trashcan and looks down inside. Hermione takes a moment to look around where they seem to be. It appears to be an ordinary playground but in the darkness it holds an ominous feeling. She sees the man reach down into the trash can. Out of it he pulls a newspaper. “Date, date, date, date, where is the date?” he mutters. “Ah there it is. Oh. Well. Okay so we might be a bit late. No, don’t growl at me! We’re only a few weeks late. He should still be around here. I’m sure you can catch him. Now go!”

 

The dog runs off into the bushes. Hermione stares at them the spot where it disappeared. This is new for her. She’s usually one of the most knowledgeable people in the room but she gets the feeling that this man has a lot of secrets, things that no one knows about. She decides to make an attempt to find out. She’s just about to ask him to explain himself, starting with the dog, when he says, “Oh no someone’s coming. Quick into the TARDIS.” He pulls her back into the police box and she vaguely wonders why he calls it the TARDIS.

 

“Now time to get you back home.”

 

“You can’t just abandon me! I have questions. Like who was that dog? Because he obviously wasn’t actually a dog. His movements were too human and the way he understood what you said- no he was definitely not a dog. Plus you said he had a godson. So how did you make him appear human? I’m guessing some sort of transfiguration spell but it must have been really strong. And how did you manage to travel in both time and space? Because we’re most certainly not in my neighborhood anymore. I’m figuring the space travel was some sort of obscure apparition trick since you brought the police box-or what did you call it? A TARDIS?- along with you in addition to the dog and myself. As for the time travel, well I’m not sure. The only way time travel is possible is with a time turner but I didn’t see you pull one out. Plus what kind of wand is that? It has to be some sort of illegal. No, none of this makes sense. It can’t just be magic. But if not magic then what is it? And who even are you? What’s your name?”

 

The man smiles and dismisses all of her questions except the last one. “I’m the Doctor.”

 

“The Doctor? Just the Doctor? Doctor who?”

 

The Doctor smiles again like he’s having an inside joke with himself. “Just the Doctor.”

 

“Well Doctor,” Hermione says walking around the middle part of the TARDIS to stand in front of where he leans against it, looking at her with amusement. “Who was that dog?”

 

“Unfortunately I can’t tell you. You will see him again though. I think.”

 

“Okay. Well what about this thing?” She gestures to the air around her. “This police box? You called it a TARDIS? What is that? What does that even mean? Is it something the Ministry of Magic is working on? How long have they been keeping that a secret?”

 

“The Ministry of- no, no it’s not them,” The Doctor says, almost hurt that she’d suggest such a thing, “It means Time and Relative Dimension in Space. And you’re right. It’s not magic. It’s a time machine. That can travel in space too. Although I’d assume you’d already have realized that. You do seem to be incredibly bright. None of the Azkaban wardens realized that dog wasn’t really a dog yet you seem to have come to that conclusion fairly quickly. I like you.”

 

“Wait Azkaban wardens? Did you just break him out of prison? How did you break out of Azkaban?” She implored indignantly. Hermione’s mind races with all the new information. She thought she’d seen everything in the past few years. Evidently, she was wrong. This has been one of the most bizarre nights of her life. Then something occurs to her and her whole body is suddenly alight with fear. “Wait a second; did you break out of Azkaban? Oh no, you’re probably some sort of deranged murderer aren’t you?”

 

“Of course _I_ didn’t break out of prison. That’s just absurd. But don’t you mind any of that. We need to get you home.”

 

“No way. You still haven’t answered my questions. If it’s not magic then, then what is it? What are you?”

 

“I’m a Time Lord. The last of the Time Lords. And if you must know, this,” he pulls out what Hermione has guessed was a metal wand, “is a sonic screw driver. Not a wand.”

 

She inspects the sonic screwdriver but when she reaches for it he pulls it away. “And you need to be getting home.”

 

She elects to overlook his last comment. “So you’re a Time Lord? What is that like some species of alien?” she jokes. He nods, completely deadpan and when she realizes that he’s actually serious she feels all the blood drain out of her face. She should be afraid. She should be _terrified_. Some mysterious alien being that just broke a potentially dangerous man out of an impregnable prison has her trapped in a strange box and the only thing she has to defend herself is her wand. And she’s not even allowed to do magic outside of school. She should be begging this man to take her home where she can return to her normal life. She should be downright horrified of what he might do instead. But she can’t seem to make herself feel that way. It’s like it’s physically impossible for her to ask him to take her back. Because curiosity is burning through her veins and she absolutely has to know more about this mysterious person and about his box and about the universe that he claims he can travel about, going anywhere anytime he wishes.

 

And she knows that her intense need for information must show in her eyes because the Doctor’s face shifts a bit. He looks at her as if he knows what she’s thinking and what she’s feeling, how she just wants to know about everything and how she sees a once in a lifetime opportunity in him.

 

“Okay, Hermione Granger. I suppose if you’re not quite ready to go home, we could take one little trip beforehand. But just one! I’ll even let you pick. You have all of time and space laid before you. Where do you want to go?” He leans against the wall of the TARDIS.

 

She stares at him blankly for a moment. The entire universe. She can go anywhere she wants. And she doesn’t even know where to begin. She bites her lip. She has one chance to see whatever she wants and she can’t waste it. But it’s the entire _universe_. She doesn’t even know the start of what’s out there! How is she supposed to make this kind of decision?

 

And then it hits her like a brick wall. She may not know what’s out there, but she knows the best place to find out. “I want to go to the biggest library in the universe.”


End file.
